The main legal point established is that an individual cannot be held responsible for the actions of their predecessor, and penalties and departmental proceedings should be justified based on the circumstances.

V.K. Bist, J.

By way of this petition, the petitioner has challenged the order dated 05.04.2010 passed by Chief Information Commissioner, Uttarakhand whereby a penalty of a sum of Rs. 10,000/- has been imposed upon the petitioner and recommendation was made for initiating departmental proceedings against the petitioner.

2. The petitioner is posted as Social Welfare Officer at Narendra Nagar, Tehri Garhwal. He joined his assignment as such on 11.09.2009. The respondent no.3, who is editor of a magazine, namely, ‘Jeevan Pariksha’, sought information from the office of District Social Officer, Tehri Garhwal on 18.08.2009. The District Social Officer, Tehri Garhwal supplied information to respondent no.3 on 02.09.2009. Aggrieved by the information, respondent no.3 filed departmental appeal before the 1st Appellate Authority i.e. Director Social Welfare Department, Haldwani/respondent no.2, stating therein that he was not supplied information in time. Respondent no.2 issued notice to the petitioner on 22.10.2009 and asked the petitioner to appear in his office on 03.11.2009.

3. It is the contention of the petitioner that the petitioner, for the first time, came to know about the fact that respondent no.3 sought certain information from the office of District Social Welfare Officer, Tehri Garhwal, merely when the said notice was served upon him.

4. The appeal was dismissed by the 1st Appellate Authority on 06.11.2009 on the ground that appellant has not mentioned in his memo of appeal as to whether he got required information or not and whether there was any shortcomings in the information, however the 1st Appellate Authority directed the petitioner to supply information relating to age certificate within a period of a week. By the said order, the petitioner was also warned. The said order was complied with by the petitioner, but the respondent no.3 was not satisfied with the said order passed by respondent no.2 and filed appeal before the State Information Commissioner/respondent no.1. Respondent no.1 directed the petitioner to appear before him on 16.02.2010 and in compliance thereof, the petitioner appeared before respondent no.1, alongwith relevant records. After hearing on the appeal, the respondent no.1 directed to fix the appeal on any other date, but no specific date was fixed. Thereafter, respondent no.1 sent an official letter no. 1816 dated 19.02.2010, purporting to furnish true copies of old aged pensioners applications, sanctioned in financial year 2008-09. By the said communication, date of hearing was fixed as 02.03.2010. Though, the said communication was dispatched by the office of respondent no.1 to the petitioner on 26.02.2010, however the same was delivered to the office of the petitioner on 04.03.2010. The matter was heard and a penalty of Rs. 10,000/- was imposed on the petitioner and direction was issued to respondent no.2 to initiate departmental proceedings against the petitioner.

5. I have considered the submissions of the counsel for the parties. I have also gone through the orders passed by the different authorities. I notice that at the time, when information was sought from the office of District Social Officer, Tehri Garhwal, the petitioner was not holding the post, but another officer was holding the post, as petitioner had joined the post only on 11.09.2009 and before that order was passed by his predecessor on 02.09.2009, therefore the petitioner cannot be held responsible for any inaction, which was done by his predecessor. Simultaneously, the petitioner cannot be held responsible for not furnishing desired information to respondent no.3, as earlier order was passed by the then Social Welfare Officer on 02.09.2009. Subsequently, the required information was also supplied to the respondent no.3. I also notice that respondent no.3 is an editor and after filing complaint as also the appeal, he did not appear before the Appellate Authorities. The Chief Information Commissioner, on his own, passed